By 
Android has been the talk of the town the last year or so and lookie lookie who wants in on the action – Microsoft. They had already released their “Tag” application for WinMo, iPhone, BlackBerry and Symbian and now of course Android. Here is the description from Android Market:
Microsoft Tag lets you discover information and entertainment by scanning mobile barcodes with your phone. Download the Tag Reader, scan a Tag anywhere you see one – in a magazine, brochure, on product packages, signs or storefronts – and access information videos, promotions, exclusive offers and much more.
But to use it… first you’ll need to find a Tag and these aren’t your ordinary barcode/QR reader tags, although similar. To get things like this going you need critical mass and I’m wondering if Microsoft’s alternative is good enough to make it popular? There is open source software out there that would have allowed Microsoft to make Tag Reader double as a barcode/QR scanner as well – why didn’t they?
If you’ve used Tag Reader on other platforms let us know your experience with it in the wild.
[Via BBC]
I think Microsoft are late to the party as there are lots of alternitives.
Yeah I’m sure people can’t wait to download that one.
lol we don’t need another type of barcode. 2d and QR code is good enough, unless microsoft’s somehow can get their code to redraw an image or give you a map
Yea, I am fine with QR codes, I like them
Isn’t this functionality already a subset of what Goggles can do?
MS tag only encodes 13 bytes of data, unlike QR code which can encode a full URL. So — with QR code, you scan the code, and your browser goes straight there. With MS Tag, you scan an ID number, then go to the MS servers, which return the actual URL. So MS Tag is a way for Microsoft to track every time someone is dumb enough to scan one of these tags. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Tag
The tag in this article says: http://tozon.info/blog
Why not Phandroid.com?
About the app: I like that it scans verry fast on my milestone, but I dislike that i need 2 different apps to scan this types of codes.
Unless MS plans to pay people to use these things I’m pretty sure this is DoA.
Microsoft is making themselves lame little apps. I’ve never seen these codes on anything. Ever. I think I’ve seen a barcode on something before, but I can’t remember what it was…oh yea…I saw on EVERYTHING!
I guess it’s too much to ask that microsoft tries using the 3d barcode?
and so it begins…
if microsoft comes out with holographic barcodes with a 4th demention so you can see whatever it is develope over time then hell yea ill get it… else, no
MS is pulling a retarded amount of spin on this app.
Let’s look at comments, shall we?
“been waiting for this since halo wars”
“microsoft makes great apps”
stuff like this…really, MS? is this the best you pay people to comment on for the market app?
These won’t work out mostly because they (seem at least) to require color. QR codes work much better since they are only in black and white.
Granted, I guess the codes may only be in print and online, but it is still limiting the options of these things being everywhere.
Let’s see.. Google started the “Favorite places” where store owners were sent barcodes to place in their window.. of course besides the usefulness of being able to scan a store for information, there is the fact that the store owner also now has a sign up with Google’s name on it.. I’m sure somebody at MS saw the genius of it.. So of course imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.. and free advertising doesn’t hurt either.
QR does the job!
UI is quite nice, but the whole phone home thing is stupid. There are a number of other techs that can encode the detail with out having to do a lookup.
I think its cool that MS published their app for Android. I think it shows definite signs of mass adoption…though I suppose MS did publish it for all the other mobile OSs out there too.
MS just has to have their own everything. MP3 and standard video formats? Oh no, they had to come out with WMA and WMV. Who uses that crap anyway voluntarily anyway? Now this. Oh boy.
I love the UI, go mircosoft!
surely I will download this one and hope it will runs ok.
decided blog you’ve procure
Everyone I know seems to have an Android.
Just for the ones who said that you will never see then anywhere.. well lowes has them in there ads so does target and wait so does walmart i never ever seen a qr in a ad at all. so microsoft is in fact doing something better then google is with there gr. and the tags that ms has made are also in black and white so to me microsoft is on the money with this app.